Maine is Getting Safer

Maine is getting safer.According to State Police Spokesman Steve McCausland homicides and fatal fires were all down from 2008.Meghan Hayward has the details.The number of fatal accidents in Maine last year remained about the same as the year before, but there were fewer deadly fires, that according to Maine State Police Spokesman Steve McCausland.Final year public safety numbers also show there were fewer homicides in Maine last year than in 2008.Police investigated 26 homicides in 2009, down from 31 the year before.That total includes the November double homicide of a Webster Plantation couple.And, the shooting death of a Newport man in OctoberThe deadliest year for homicides in Maine was 1989 when 40 deaths were reported.The fewest was 2000, when 11 homicides were investigated.On Maine roads, there were 158 deaths last year, three more than 2008, according to the Bureau of Highway Safety.One of those, an accident in Bangor in November that claimed two lives after a car crashed into a house on High Street.And, a Cannan man died after he was ejected from a vehicle in Clinton.But, 2008 and 2009 were the safest on Maine roads in the last fifty years.The State Fire Marshal’s office says 14 people died in fires during 2009.A fire in Searsport in February claimed the lives of two people who were trapped inside.That number matches the death toll in 1991 as the second safest year ever.In, 1995 and 2007, 12 people lost their lives in fires.